[Avodah] [TorahMusings] Receiving Credit Card Benefit on Purchase for Someone Else

[Micha Berger]

>From Torah Musings.
https://www.torahmusings.com/2018/02/receiving-credit-card-benefit-purchase-someone-else/

I has starting reading this wondering about both ribis and whether it
was fair to the credit card company or taking advantage of a flaw in the
contract. RDN addresses the former by a particular approach to the
company's motives.

Purim alegra y dulce!
-micha


Receiving Credit Card Benefit on Purchase for Someone Else
by R. Daniel Mann

Question: Reuven paid for Shimon's plane ticket using his credit card
and was to be reimbursed. Is it considered that Reuven lent money to
Shimon, so that if Reuven receives more than he gave because of credit
card points he earned, it is ribbit (forbidden usury)? Also, who deserves
to get the points, i.e., should Reuven credit Shimon for his gain?

Answer: When Reuven gave money to the airlines via his credit card
based on Simon's request, it is indeed considered as if he lent
money to Shimon. This is based on a broad concept known as arvut
(guarantorship). By means of arvut, the one who becomes obligated
is not the one who received the money (the airline) but the one
who requested the money to reach the party he specified (Shimon)
(Kiddushin 7a). This concept can be used in creating loan obligations,
kiddushin, and transactions. Thus, if Shimon would refuse to pay Reuven
back because Reuven did not directly give him anything, we would say
"Are you kidding?! When asking Reuven to pay the airlines, you said
(or implied) you would pay Shimon back."

Now that we have determined that Reuven has, effectively and halachically,
lent money to Shimon, the question is whether Reuven can receive benefit
as a result of the transaction. Indeed, ribbit is not only when a lender
receives money straight from the hand of the borrower. If, for example,
the borrower wanted to give the interest to the lender by means of a
shaliach (agent), it would also be forbidden.

However, the problem is only if the benefit that Reuven receives is, in
some way, coming from Shimon (Bava Metzia 69b). This case is different
because of the nature of the benefit the credit card company gives
Reuven. Because credit card companies benefit when their card is used
more times/for larger sums of money, they sometimes give incentives to
cardholders to use their card as much as possible. The company, thus,
gives benefit to the cardholder, i.e., because Reuven decided to use
their credit card; they are certainly not doing it at Shimon's behest.
Therefore, there is no problem of ribbit.

Is Reuven, though, required to give or share the gain with Shimon, and,
then, if Shimon waived his rights, would that waiver not be considered
ribbit? The gemara (Ketubot 98b) asks about a case in which someone
serves as an agent to buy a certain amount of a commodity for a buyer
for a certain price, and the seller decides to give more commodity
than was requested. The gemara says that if the object does not have
a set price, we say that the buyer's money ended up bringing him more
than expected. If, though, there was a set price, we view the extra as
a present.

Who receives the present? The gemara accepts the opinion that it is
divided equally between the buyer and the agent. Rashi explains that
this is because there is a doubt for whom the present was intended.
Based on this, the Rama (Choshen Mishpat 183:6) says that if the seller
specified that he added on for the agent, the agent keeps the whole
surplus. The Rif (Ketubot 57b of his pages) says that even assuming the
agent was the intended recipient, the buyer deserves a share because
the benefit came through him. The Beit Yosef prefers the Rif's opinion,
and the Shach (183:12) wonders why the Rama wrote according to Rashi as
if it is agreed upon.

One might have claimed that our case depends on the machloket of
the Rif, Rashi et al., as Reuven got the benefit because of Shimon's
purchase. However, in this case, Shimon is less directly involved with
the credit card company than the gemara's seller is to the buyer. Also,
the "present" is part of an ongoing deal between company and client
(Reuven), to which Shimon is not a party. The Rashba (Meyuchas L'Ramban
60; see K'tzot Hachoshen 283:7) says that when the present is because
of the agent's relationship with the seller, the agent receives the
whole benefit.

In summary, based on your description, Reuven need not credit Shimon
for the points benefit, and there is no problem of ribbit.

2018-02-28

About Daniel Mann

This column is produced on behalf of Eretz Hemdah by Rabbi Daniel Mann.
Rabbi Mann is a Dayan for Eretz Hemdah and a staff member of Yeshiva
University's Gruss Kollel in Israel. He is a senior member of the Eretz
Hemdah responder staff, editor of Hemdat Yamim and the author of Living
the Halachic Process, volumes 1 and 2 and A Glimpse of Greatness.